Chapter Ten
Nakomii didn’t know what to do. It was doubtful, if he flew, that there would be land close enough for him to land on. But if he stayed… oh, if he stayed…
Not for the first time, the dragon wished he could close his eyes. Or could block out the memory. He had left, it had been for the best, but why did he feel so horrible? As if something bad would happen if he didn’t return to take care of his little one?
But she wasn’t his! She was nothing more then a pest, a mistake of the creator’s, something to be killed. It didn’t matter she was one of Dekalagh’s chosen. He should have killed the little pest, as any other dragon would have. But he hadn’t, he had failed. Trembling, he looked at the ocean. The water frightened him. Something stronger then he, bigger, able to kill him if he touched it…
Was that how pests felt, when a dragon dropped out of the sky on top of them? Powerless, knowing that they were going to die but having to fight for life anyway? Nakomii didn’t know. He wasn’t sure he liked the feeling he got, standing near the ocean. So, how could his little one understand? How could she stay near him, when he was a dragon and she a pest?
She had run from him. Nakomii remembered, she had grown to slowly trust him. It was wrong, absolutely wrong, but it had happened.
He could always return to his home. He would be able to hunt, he was stronger, bigger. Obelisk wouldn’t be able to taunt him, hurt him, any more. Nodding to himself, Nakomii started walking. For lack of anything better to do, he walked by the ocean. The feeling he got, fear and respect and a need to get away as fast as possible, it was heady. And the longer he resisted the pressure from the ocean, the stronger he was.
Nakomii left the large body of water behind. Not by much, though, he could always hear the waves against the shore, smell the salt. The birds that hunted the sea dove at him sometimes, stupidly getting close to his mouth. When that happened he would snap at them, and two out of three times had a bunch of feathers and flesh in his mouth. He was able to swallow the whole bird without stopping, although the feathers sometimes got stuck in his teeth.
Nakomii looked behind him. Storm clouds built up along the horizon, dark and frightening because if he was in the air when the storm hit… he’d be dead. Plain and simple. Even though he was on the ground, he still shrank a little into himself. Turning back towards his destination, he started to run. His run, on two legs with wings and arms folded tight against the rest of him, tail stretched out behind him. Fast, but not fast enough.
Behind him, he could hear the thunder as the storm got closer. The winds pushed against him, and he slowed down to walk. The first cold splatter of rain hit his back and coursed down his sides, followed by more and more. Cold as snow, and yet liquid and thus unwelcome, freezing and burning because it was so cold, Nakomii decided he really didn’t like the rain. But there was no escape in flight, because of the wind that pushed on one side and then the other, keeping him grounded.
There was no way he’d be able to travel if he couldn’t see, and the rain was coursing over his eyes. Stopping, he lay down and curled into a ball, his wings covering his head.
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Dekani paused when the big cat paused. She had moved close enough to see the pale, moonlight blue that it was. Her throat constricted, but no noise came from her mouth. The big cat started to move. Dekani started to move.
The cat was leading the way into a treed area. Dekani was startled, but not enough to stop hunting. Unlike the giant evergreen trees, the firs and pine, these trees had large, flat leaves that were a strange orange color, all lit by the pale blue moonlight. The large cat paused, and raised its great head to sniff the air. Dekani too sniffed the air, which was almost over powered by the great cat’s scent. The wind was blowing Dekani’s scent away from the cat, and even if it hadn’t, her scent was foreign, unlikely to alarm the great hunter. Interest, maybe, but alarm? Unlikely.
The cat started off again.
Dekani followed, stepping where the cat had stepped, walking while the cat walked and stopping when the cat stopped. All the time, gathering her strength for the first and only attack she would have.
The wind shifted, then. The big cat smelt Dekani’s scent and, in a liquid fast movement, had turned to face the smaller girl.
Dekani didn’t see how she could do any different. In a shallow lung, she raked her nails down the cat’s muzzle, silencing the roar that was building. Instead, the cat hissed and hit her with its paw, sending the slender girl into a tree.
Gasping, Dekani stood up. Her side burned where the cat’s claws had raked her skin, tearing it open, but she felt fine, if a little shaken. Her fingers curved, hooking into claws tipped with wicked black claws. And the big cat still hadn’t roared, hadn’t brought its pride.
The cat started towards Dekani, who darted to the side. The cat let her, before pouncing on her back, great claws digging into her shoulders. With a muffled yelp, Dekani tried to reach behind her with her nails at the forefront, and managed to stab the limb holding her down. With a low growl, the paw lifted and Dekani turned over onto her back, to look into the mouth of the cat.
Her heart pounding in her ears and temples, Dekani dug her nails into the large cat’s flesh, bringing her feet up to rake her toes down the cat’s stomach. Then it yowled, for Dekani’s toenails were just as sharp and venomous as her fingernails.
But the scrapes were just minor annoyances to a cat of that size. Dekani knew this, but before she could do anything more, her shoulder was crushed by teeth that nature had chosen to break through bone. Dekani’s shoulder shattered, while needle sharp claws raked down her leg.
Head falling back, Dekani screamed. Eyes wide and unseeing, her fingers spasmed, digging her nails even deeper, leading to the cat to shake its head and thus the ensnared girl. Pain tore through Dekani’s mind, pain she had never before experienced. Animalistic, she growled and shrieked her pain, trying to curve her neck around enough to bite the cat, make it let go. The cat’s ear quickly became shredded, and the flesh around it was laid open to the bone. And still the cat clawed at her, jaws embedded in her shoulder.
When the sun rose, Dekani was near death. Her chest barely rose and fell, eyes empty and open halfway. The big cat had let her go when her nails had been pulled out of its flesh. Dekani’s finger’s remained in the curled position.
The big cat almost missed half the flesh on its head, strips hanging where Dekani had been unable to reach to continue tearing. The scratches on its nose were raw and sore to the touch, while the holes where Dekani’s nails had been digging in were starting to puff up. The scrapes on the cat’s stomach were also aggravated in the same way.
The cat was dieing from poison. Dekani was dieing from blood loss. It was a toss up for which would live or die, but since the cat had a lot of venom in its blood, and Dekani had barely enough blood to live in her body, it was likely that both would die.
As a last, conscious effort, Dekani managed to drag herself under some thorn bushes. It would hopefully be enough.
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Nakomii couldn’t shake the feeling that something was wrong. Not just his leaving his little one, but that, well… He had left the mountains. He had never thought of returning, had never wanted to make his way back there.
But as the hills grew into foot hills, and the foot hills into mountains, and he started to fly again, he had to admit that he was returning.
Nakomii no longer saw the mountain as unchanging. He could see the changes, could feel the changes. And as his old range came into sight, he couldn’t get rid of the feeling that he was doing something very, very wrong indeed…
